Triple play networks (also referred to as broadband networks) aim to provide video, data and voice to residential users. These networks usually include various routers, switches aggregators and the like that are capable of transferring various types of information encapsulated in packets or frames, but are not able to dynamically manipulate or compress video streams.
A typical triple play network includes a super headend (SHE), multiple video headend offices and multiple video switching offices (also referred to as central offices) that include access nodes (such as Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexers—DSLAMs) that are connected to multiple residential devices.
The access node can receive a certain amount of incoming bandwidth. It sends, usually over pairs of twisted wires, information streams that conveys data, video and voice.
The number of resident devices as well as the bandwidth requested by each device has dramatically increased during the last few years. Applications such as high definition television require substantial bandwidth. A typical home may include multiple televisions, multiple computers and multiple high performance communication devices such as digital phones and the like. In many homes these devices are connected to the access network via a residential access gateway. The residential access gateway can also be viewed as an end-user device.
The bandwidth that can be supplied to a certain residential access getaway is responsive to the distance between that gateway and between the access node that can be located within the central office.
The bandwidth that is requested by a residential access gateway can dramatically change from hour to hour and from day to day. In order to maintain a profitable telecommunication services telecommunication suppliers usually design their network to support characteristic bandwidth consumption requirements, and not necessarily maximal and especially unreasonable scenarios. The network design usually includes parameters such as the locations of the DSLAMs, the input bandwidth of the DSLAMs and the output bandwidth that can be output from the DSLAM (either aggregate bandwidth or bandwidth per end-user).
There is a growing need to provide efficient methods and devices for providing video, data and voice to end user devices.